Hitherto, an indoor unit of an air-conditioning apparatus has been proposed in which a plurality of vertical vanes that deflects airflow to be blown out from an air outlet in a left/right direction are provided in the air outlet. In this kind of conventional indoor unit, when the airflow to be blown out from the air outlet is deflected with the vertical vanes in the left/right direction, conditioned air is not blown out to the desired direction at the side end portion of the air outlet on the deflection side, thus a problem that the left/right airflow angle of the air outlet cannot be widened is encountered. For example, when the airflow to be blown out from the air outlet is deflected to the left with the vertical vanes and when the vertical vane increases the deflection angle, the air that has been deflected by one or more vertical vanes near the left end side of the air outlet impinges on the left sidewall of the indoor unit; hence, the direction of the air is disadvantageously altered to the front direction.
Further, depending on the positioning and spacing of each of the vertical vanes, the rate of airflow impinging on the sidewall of the indoor unit increases; hence, a case in which the general direction of the airflow blown out from the air outlet is directed to an unexpected direction has been created.
Accordingly, in order to widen the left/right airflow angle of the air outlet, a known indoor unit of an air-conditioning apparatus is proposed in which the indoor unit of the air-conditioning apparatus is “provided with an air outlet 7 formed between a stabilizer 4 and a rear guider 5 and with rotatable left/right wind direction changing blades 6 that changes a left/right direction of air blown out from the air outlet 7, in which the entire left/right wind direction changing blades 6 are disposed outside the air outlet 7 such that the indoor unit is capable of controlling the air direction with the left/right wind direction changing blades 6 at a location nearer to the user, leading to improved comfort. Unlike conventional cases in which the left/right wind direction changing blades 6 are mounted inside the air outlet 7, since there is not side walls 1b at both ends of the left/right wind direction changing blades 6, it is possible to obtain a wide discharge angle of the blown out air” (see Patent Literature 1).